In information technology (IT) based businesses in which information services are provided by computer resource suppliers and are consumed by information services consumers, requirements for service level guarantees have created a demand for accountability that transcends enterprise and service provider environments. Inside enterprise organizations, service commitments are needed to justify expenditures for IT infrastructure, which are often significant. In many IT service engagements, service providers are required to prove the value of services being delivered, particularly when these services are often obtained at a premium price. Therefore, failure to deliver may mean the success or failure of the service provider. Service level agreements (SLAs) define the terms and provisions for measuring service accountability as well as for ensuring that all current and planned IT services are delivered to agreed achievable targets. Service Level Management (SLM) enables the definition, measurement, and reporting of SLA compliance, to wit, SLM is about ensuring that objective measures set forth by the SLA are implemented and delivered in satisfaction of the information services consumers.
SLAs can apply to almost any IT services. Examples of IT services include outsourcing of wide area network (WAN) managed services or remote local area network (LAN) services, or managing data warehouses for end users. Other examples may involve the combination of technologies for a given business service such as network and servers that support an overriding quality of service (QoS) for an enterprise application.
IT managers and service providers increasingly use flexible, standards-based SLM tools to measure adherence to SLAs. In many cases, SLM tools are programmed to comply with ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) standards, which provide a set of practices for IT service management that focuses on aligning IT services with the needs of business. Despite these efforts, there still are challenges of delivering IT services and ensuring end-to-end availability and performance across diverse technological infrastructure with the goal of maintaining and improving end-user satisfaction.